music

zero

2016

Zero was conceived in an old farmhouse in the heart of the Canadian Appalachians. The concept was a seed planted for what would become an equally destructive and regenerative process for LITTLE SUNS and band leader John Aaron Cockburn. Midway through the process their record label decided to withdraw support for the album and the band subsequently branched off - Cockburn sought refuge in yurt and later a converted school bus on Salt Spring Island while the rest of the band dispersed to Ottawa, Montreal, and New York City. After a year long period of rejuvenation and reflection, Cockburn and drummer Liam Smith reunited in 2015 and raised enough money to build their own production studio. It took two more years of self-learning, overcoming a knee injury, and sojourns to India for Cockburn to announce the release of their newest EP Zero.

Little Suns draws influences from folk music from every corner of the world which is then filtered through each band member's respective qualities and style giving listeners a western pop audio experience. Effortlessly laced with heavy eastern European influence after John Aaron Cockburn and Robin Meyer-MacLeod ventured off to Romania and Hungary it was there with instruments strapped to their backs that a new sound was created. This musical pilgrimage gave Normal Human Feelings its authentic reverberation. "Being immersed in the culture I was trying to emulate at the time, it gave more realism to and authenticity (to the sound) of what I was trying to create. In general, travel helped expand my worldview," says John Aaron Cockburn on the musical journey that brought him back to his roots in turn giving life to the Eastern Europe influence that achieves a universal resonance.

Over the course of a year, producer Leon Taheny tweaked the fusion of sounds to make a cohesive arrangement of songs while emphasizing on the strengths. Other arrangements and lyrics were born more organically and on the fly lending to the worldly sound and majestic vibe that makes up Little Sun.

"I would rather let listeners and reviewers classify our music than try to attempt to do it ourselves," -John Aaron Cockburn of the eclectic mix of sounds and feelings that makes up Little Suns.